1924-2002
Eero Autio published three books: Karjalan kalliopiirrokset (Otava 1981), Kultasarvipeura ja sen klaani (Atena Kustannus 1993) and Kotkat, Hirvet, Karhut – permiläistä pronssitaidetta (Atena Kustannus 2000). His curriculum includes 14 research articles and several newspaper articles. He made numerous trips to Europe and, in terms of ancient art, especially to Sweden, Norway, Russian Karelia and Kola, the Urals and Siberia. Eero Autio was a founding member of the Estonian Society of Ancient Art, as well as the Finnish Society of Ancient Art. He was a popular speaker at international conferences
KARELIAN PETROGLYPHS
The major milestones in Finnish ancient art are the year 1911, when the composer Jean Sibelius discovered Finland’s first rock painting on the shore of Lake Hviträski, and 1968, when the most significant complex in our country, the Ristiina Astuvansalmi, was discovered. Astuvansalmi caused great activity in the search for new discoveries. Today, 130 Finnish rock art sites are known. Autio’s book Karjalan kalliopiirrokset was the starting shot for Finnish interest in international ancient art. Information was oozing from the large picture fields of the Norwegian Alta, and now the story-like stories of the thousands of figures in Lake Onega and the White Sea Uikujoki, which had never been seen in Finland, came to light.
Autio’s Estonian research partners gathered in large camps of experts from various fields on the shores of Lake Ääninen in the summer. First of all, they discovered a large number of new carvings, but most importantly, as experts from various fields, they considered the relationship of the rock paintings to astronomy, plant history, zoology, geology, geography, events at the sites of occurrence, art history, textile history, and, in Lake Ääninen in particular, ceramics and archaeology. What peoples and which language groups did the artists represent, what genetic heritage? Can a calendar or the annual cycle of life be found in the paintings? Hunting? Fishing? How developed must Stone Age society have been when it was able to equip a large fleet for whaling in the stormy White Sea? A collaborative body was needed for such diverse artists and scientists. The Estonian Ancient Art Society was founded, with Eero Autio as one of its founding members. The interest in ancient art was so great that a few years later the Society of Finnish Ancient Art was founded, with Eero Autio as one of the founding members.
As an active participant in field trips and seminars, Eero Autio was able to develop international pressure to recognize the significance of the Karelian deposits. So, finally, in 2021, UNESCO included these 6,200-4,600-year-old carvings on its World Heritage List; 1,200 figures from 22 sites on Lake Onega and 3,411 patterns from 11 sites on the White Sea. Swans, sun and moon symbols, deer, elk, people skiing and ships hunting whales with harpoons, geometric patterns and human and animal footprints skillfully tell the story of the high level of creativity of Fennoscandia and the Stone Age people, according to UNESCO.
GOLDEN-HORNED DEER AND ITS CLAN
The rock carvings on the Kola Peninsula were interpreted as one line of the Sámi story tradition, whose hero was the cult figure Meandaš, who lived as a human and a deer. Autio’s second work raises questions about the contribution of Kola stories to the pictorial tradition. The hero Meandaš serves as an example of the strength of symbols in real life. The mythical combination of a human and a deer changes form; among people he acts as a human, when he goes to the fells he transforms himself into a deer. When the hero notices the inability of humans to survive in the difficult conditions of the north, he teaches his ex-wife’s new husband to hunt deer - himself, so that his own children can survive in a world where the water in the rapids is blood, waves from the lungs and stones from the liver.
PERMIANS ANIMAL STYLE
If the previous two books required a lot of processing of archive material unknown to Finns, Kotkat, Hirvet, Karhut – permiläistä pronssitaidetta needed it incomparably more, and in Russian. The research room upstairs on Vattuniemenkatu was filled with copies and papers. In the entire long art history of the Finno-Ugric peoples, Permian bronze castings are considered the most significant international achievement. Greater Perm emerged west of the Urals in the years 300-1300, with the Komi and Udmurts as its main peoples, and later the Komi-Permyaks. The geographical center of Eurasia was the area around the Kama, Vyatka, Pechora and Volga rivers, expanding in terms of artistic tradition across the Urals all the way to the Ob River, with the Hanseatic League and Mansi joining in. High-quality bronze casting was based on the prevalence of metals and a high standard of living. The rivers were the foundation, and trade routes across the Urals ran along three paths: the Byzantine, Iranian and Scandinavian routes. The Permian and more broadly Siberian animal style spread all the way to Finland and the Pacific Ocean. A civilization was born that developed a spiritual heritage in which the creation of the world is carried out by a waterfowl, the hybrid animals duck-deer and the hybrid hero Sulde – bird/deer/human - define a three-level world order.
Art conquered everyday life so that spoons, buckles, food cups, pendants were decorated with three-dimensional images of fur animals, bears, moose, beavers and people. Finns had the opportunity to get acquainted with Permian castings as early as 1875, when Johan Reinhold Aspelin published the book Suomalais-ugrilaisen muinaistutkinnon alkeita and a few years later Muinaisjäännöksiä Suomen suvun asumusaloilta. In addition to Aspelin, the collections of the National Board of Antiquities have included Permian castings by A.O.Heikel, Artturi Kannisto, K.F.Karjalainen, K.R.Donner and U.T.Sirelius. In recent years, more Permian material has been found in archaeological excavations. Eero Autio described the collections of Permian casts at the Estonian National Museum, the Krusenstiern collection in Tallinn, the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, Moscow, and in the Urals in the collections of his collaborators Perm University and Perm Museum, as well as in the Solikamsk and Cherdyn museums. The roots and development of Permian art were his starting point. The explanation of the world began with the duck, and he explained family communities and totemism using the genealogical concepts of eagles, moose and bears. The most significant figure of Permian art, which is completely absent elsewhere, was a composite creature of moose-bird-human, a hybrid of three life forms.
The casts feature the tree of life, goddesses, the symbolism of numbers, birds flying on their chests, human faces, the lizard of the underworld, the deer-headed duck, horsewomen, sun circles, and all themes should be viewed in the context of their discovery. Is the object from a dwelling place, ancient castles, a cemetery, or a sacrificial site? Were women bronze casters? How has the imagery continued to develop later in textiles, woodwork, and ceramics? The study of the Permian Casts of the Desert is actually an investigation of the Finno-Ugric way of life, beliefs, myths, and everyday life. International literature considers the Permian animal style to be the most unique and mysterious in Eurasia. It left no written evidence, so the images are the only starting point for interpretation.
Antero Kare
